Tuesday, March 10, 2009

I took this big hunk of meat out of the freezer a few days ago. I didn't have any specific plans for it, and it sat there at least an extra day while we finished up the blue-cheese filled meatballs I made the other day. Don't worry, they weren't anything special, just the same recipe for meatballs I posted a week or two ago, but with holes smooshed into the middle of each (still fist size!) meatball, and a hunk of blue cheese shoved in. I baked them instead of cooking them in sauce.

I didn't come here today to talk to you about blue-cheese meatballs. I'm here to talk about pot roast. And roasted broccoli. Because both of these things are soo easy to make, I'm combining them. Plus, voila! Dinner! We added greenbeans (frozen, put into a hot pan, drizzled with olive oil and salt and pepper and a bit of garlic powder and cooked on high heat for a minute or two). While the pot roast takes quite a while to cook, it's one of those 'toss it in the oven and go watch a movie or two' recipes.

2-3 lb boneless chuck roast (this is a cheap cut of meat, full of fat)

1 T olive oil

salt, pepper, garlic powder, thyme

1 onion, roughly chopped

3/4 c red wine

Preheat oven to 225. Heat oil in a pan big enough to hold the meat without a lot of extra room until sizzling. Sprinkle each side of the meat generously with salt, pepper, garlic powder, and thyme. Sear meat on each side until well browned, about 5 minutes on each side. Once seared, hold the meat out of the pan and scatter the onions underneath. Add the wine, and add the meat back. Cover, put the pan in the oven, and go do something else for 4 to 5 hours.

Remove the meat (carefully, it will be falling apart) from the pan and set aside. Skim the oil off the top of the juice left in the pan (using a gravy separater is easiest) and then strain the liquid through a sieve. Smush the onions up into a pulp and add back to the juice. You can use this as is or boil it down a bit to concentrate the flavor further. Serve the juice over the meat.

Roasted broccoli

Unfortunately this is best when you cook it at a higher temperature than 225, so you need to cook this after the meat is done. I really really highly reccomend cooking broccoli this way. It's so good. So good. The onions get all sweet and tender, the broccoli does too, and with a little brown around the edges.....yum.

1-2 crowns broccoli

1/2 to 1 onion

salt and pepper

olive oil

Preheat your oven to 400. Cut the broccoli into florets, chop up the stems, and dice the onion. Toss with a good drizzle of olive oil and a generous sprinkle of salt and pepper. Roast 15-25 minutes, depending on how much broccoli you have. Pierce a thicker stem with a fork to test doneness. If you're feeling crazy, you can sprinkle everything with a good bit of Parmesan cheese, but that's up to you.